Dear Mr. Smith

We have been made aware of the Organisational Change Proposal for ISD, which proposes to make 38 posts redundant and remove crucial services to the UCL community: Health Creatives, Digital Media and Research IT Services Facilitation, and to start a further reorganisation of Faculty IT.

The targeted teams provide a specialised service for UCL. They have valuable expertise and local knowledge, and collaborate closely with academics and researchers: they are an integral part of the academic team. Outsourcing means that their specific institutional expertise will either be lost or replaced by an inadequate, and in many cases more expensive, alternative.

To be a leader in digital education and research UCL has to provide serious investment not “cost-neutral” changes that threaten redundancy, either outsourcing the work, moving it to overworked colleagues or pushing a ‘self-service’ model that invites academic colleagues to do the work themselves.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, ISD colleagues have gone above and beyond the call of duty, expanding our digital capability at extremely short notice, supporting hundreds of academics to move their teaching and research online, and providing the means to continue and expand the effort to tackle the pandemic. Without their tireless work we would not have been able to support our community at all during the past year.

We understand that the change proposal includes a welcome expansion of the digital education and information security capabilities. However, the proposed new roles will not substitute for the services that will be discontinued, nor provide suitable redeployment opportunities for the vast majority of at-risk staff.

We urge you to keep these services in house, extend the consultation period to 90 days, to agree to a guarantee of no compulsory redundancies, and to seek a real increase in investment for ISD.

Initial signatories

Tony Brown, ISD UCU rep
Colin Byelong, ISD UCU rep
Ilektra Christidi, ISD UCU rep
Philip Riebold, ISD UCU rep
Jim Tyson, ISD UCU rep

Alun Coker, UCL UCU Health and Safety Officer
Ruth Dar, UCL UCU Treasurer
Seán Doyle, Lecturer in Education & UCL UCU Executive Committee
Saladin Meckled-Garcia, UCL UCU joint Vice President
Mark Newman, UCL IOE UCU rep & UCL UCU Executive Committee
James Price, UCL UCU Environment Officer
Richard Pettinger (Prof.), UCL UCU Executive Committee
Masha Sibiryakova, Lecturer (Teaching), SSEES UCU Rep, UCL UCU Joint Anti-casualisation Officer
Ala'a Sheehabi, UCL UCU Executive Committee
Holly Smith, UCL UCU joint Vice President
Nalini Vital, UCL UCU Executive, Equalities, and dept rep, CLIE
Sean Wallis, UCL UCU President
Martin Fry, Dept of Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering
Jason Davies , Associate Professor (Teaching)
Sonja Curtis, UCL UCU Executive Committee
Bella Vivat, Principal Research Fellow; UCL UCU Executive Committee (anti-casualisation officer (research))
Nikki Shure, Associate Professor
Konstantinos Petrides, Professor
Caroline Oliver, Associate Professor in Sociology
Edward Edmondson,
Peter Mullany , Professor of Molecular Microbiology
Maria-Novella Mercuri, Dr
Alina Konradt, Union member, associate lecturer
Louise Gaynor, UCU member
Darren Watts, Accommodation manager
Ali Abolfathi
Dr Mike Witcombe, Project Manager, Physics and Astronomy
Huw Jones, Senior Graphic Designer
Helen Petterson, Digital Print Specialist
Tuomas Koskela
Raquel Alegre, Senior Research Software Developer
David Pérez-Suárez, Senior Research Software Developer at RSDG/RITS/ISD
Stef Piatek, Senior Research Software Developer
Andrew N Phillips, Professor of Epidemiology
Karoline Kuchenbaecker, Associate Professor in Genetic Epidemiology
Iona Preston, Liaison Librarian
Jolene Skordis, Professor of Economics
Anne Skinner
Lara Goscé, Dr
Colette Smith, Associate Professor
Jorge Díaz-Cintas , Professor of Translation
Patricia Hamilton, Marie Curie Fellow
Ben Waugh
Niamh Murtagh, Senior Research Fellow
Qasir Shah
Lesley Gourlay , Professor of Education
Liz Halstead, Senior Research Fellow
Mark Dsouza, Associate Professor
Christopher Harker, Associate Professor
Dagmara Dimitriou, Reader, Director of Sleep Education and Research Laboratory
Shivani Singh, Associate Professor (Teaching)
Ruth Jacklin
Alessandro Cozzi-Lepri, Associate Professor
Alessandro Felder, Research Software Developer
Nicola Shelton, Professor of Population Health
Amy Horton, Lecturer in Economic Geography
Dr. Nicole Blum, Senior Lecturer UCL IOE
Elizabeth Graham, Professor
Michele Farmer
Loveleen Bansi-Matharu, Senior research associate
Mark Freeman, Reader in Education and Social History
Stephan Beck, Professor
Thomas Kador, Associate Professor (Teaching)
Eileen Kennedy, Senior Research Fellow
Jay Derrick, Dr
Eve Dickson, Research Assistant
Mary Richardson, Associate Professor, Educational Assessment
Jason Davies, Associate Professor (Teaching)
Lily Kahn, Professor of Hebrew and Jewish Languages
Brian Alston, Research Computing Analyst
James Kneale, Associate Professor
Andrew Martin, Professor of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology, SMB
Hans van de Koot, Reader in Linguistics
Bas Aarts, Professor
Jann Matlock, Associate Professor
Jan-Peter Muller, Professor of Image understanding and remote sensing, MSSL, Professor
Matthew Towers, Lecturer (Teaching)
Philip Schofield, Professor
Chris Routh, ION Senior Teaching Administrator
Jurg Bahler, Professor
Harry Dimitriou, Bartlett Professor of Planning Studies
David Osrin, Professor of Global Health
Ross Bates
Nazif Alic, Associate Professor
Jenny Bird, Public Policy Manager
Stefanie Anyadi, UCU member
Caroline Sabin, Professor of Medical Statistics and Epidemiology
Dr Pete Duncan, UCL SSEES, Honorary Associate Professor
Paola Ceccarelli, Associate professor
Alinda Damsma, Lecturer (Teaching)
Teresa McConlogue, Associate Professor
Nick Eva, Network Design & Delivery
Sherrill Stroschein, Reader in Politics
William Hay, Senior System Administrator
Paul Prior, UCU rep
Jessica Womack,
Helen Xanthaki, Professor
Alice Breeveld, Senior Research Fellow
Vanessa Freedman, Subject Liaison Librarian
Anastasis Georgoulas, Dr
Prof John Potter, Professor of Media in Education / IOE REP
Jo Lampard
Sara Bragg, Lecturer
Rachel Stuchbury, Senior Research Associate
Lucy Waitt, Curatorial and Collections UCL Culture
Sarah Pickering, Lecturer (Teaching)
Pat Withington, Research Finance and Administrative Officer
Jens Kandt, Associate Professor
Jonathan Delmage , BSc (hons) literature

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